Verner's Pride eBook

“I will come in another time when you are more
yourself, mother,” was all he said. “I
could have borne sympathy from you this morning, better
than complaint.”

He shook hands with her. He laid his hand in
silence on Decima’s shoulder with a fond pressure
as he passed her; her face was turned from him, the
tears silently streaming down it. He nodded to
Lucy, who stood at the other end of the room, and
went out. But, ere he was half-way across the
ante-room, he heard hasty footsteps behind him.
He turned to behold Lucy Tempest, her hands extended,
her face streaming down with tears.

“Oh, Lionel, please not to go away thinking
nobody sympathises with you! I am so grieved;
I am so sorry! If I can do anything for you, or
for Sibylla, to lighten the distress, I will do it.”

He took the pretty, pleading hands in his, bending
his face until it was nearly on a level with hers.
But that emotion nearly over-mastered him in the moment’s
anguish, the very consciousness that he might be free
from married obligations, would have rendered his manner
cold to Lucy Tempest. Whether Frederick Massingbird
was alive or not, he must be a man isolated
from other wedded ties, so long as Sibylla remained
on the earth. The kind young face, held up to
him in its grief, disarmed his reserve. He spoke
out to Lucy as freely as he had done in that long-ago
illness, when she was his full confidante. Nay,
whether from her looks, or from some lately untouched
chord in his memory reawakened, that old time was
before him now, rather than the present, as his next
words proved.

“Lucy, with one thing and another, my heart
is half broken. I wish I had died in that illness.
Better for me! Better—­perhaps—­for
you.”

“Not for me,” said she, through her tears.
“Do not think of me. I wish I could help
you in this great sorrow!”

“Help from you of any sort, Lucy, I forfeited
in my blind wilfulness,” he hoarsely whispered.
“God bless you!” he added, wringing her
hands to pain. “God bless you for ever!”

She did not loose them. He was about to draw
his hands away, but she held them still, her tears
and sobs nearly choking her.

“You spoke of India. Should it be that
land that you choose for your exile, go to papa.
He may be able to do great things for you. And,
if in his power, he would do them, for Sir
Lionel Verner’s sake. Papa longs to know
you. He always says so much about you in his letters
to me.”

“You have never told me so, Lucy.”

“I thought it better not to talk to you too
much,” she simply said. “And you
have not been always at Deerham.”

Lionel looked at her, holding her hands still.
She knew how futile it was to affect ignorance of
truths in that moment of unreserve; she knew that
her mind and its feelings were as clear to Lionel as
though she had been made of glass, and she spoke freely
in her open simplicity. She knew, probably, that
his deepest love and esteem were given to her.
Lionel knew it, if she did not; knew it to his very
heart’s core. He could only reiterate his
prayer, as he finally turned from her—­“God
bless you, Lucy, for ever, and for ever!”